DELHI: Street Food

WOW it's been a long time. Long story short, we were in Delhi for two weeks, then my computer had a virus (don't worry, I gave it Cipro, it's fine now) and we're getting ready to leave for Sri Lanka for two weeks.

Delhi was a gastronomical delight. I won't bore you with details, but let the photos speak for themselves. I have many to share, but I'll start with some of my favorite: street food.

Almond milk.

Naan at the world famous Karim's in Chandni Chowk.

Facade of Karim's. People come all over the country for the kebabs here.

Jalebis (a very sugary sweet crystalized dessert made in the same fashion as a funnel cake: deep fried in swirling patterns) at the famous jalebi shop in Chandni Chowk.

Lassiwallah with his clay pots of goodness.

The lassi. Incredible.

Nuts and fruits on beautiful display for the Ramadan season.

Chaiwallah mixes up a brilliant concoction.

The finished product.

Veggiewallah as the crowds of Chandni Chowk pass him by.

PROTEIN!!

As many people know, I LOVE protein. I think most people don't eat enough of it, especially vegetarians. I'm not totally on the super-low-carb-bandwagon yet, but I do think making sure your entire diet doesn't consist of idlies for breakfast, aloo gobi and rice for lunch, and biryani for dinner every day is important....

.... even though that sounds like a pretty delicious day to me, admittedly....

Anyway... I love my protein sources. The only food I do miss in India are those jam-packed protein powerhouses... such as:

Tempeh

Greek yogurt

Cottage cheese

Seitan

It's possible that, like most food I've looked for here, all of these are available and I just don't know where to look. If anyone knows where to find them PLEASE tell me! I will make you a pie!

Anyway, I do love me some dal (lentils) and rajma (beans) but I often find myself coming up short in protein at the end of the day.

One day I saw massive packages of protein powder- very similar to the ones found in the US- you know... the ones that are only about 1/3 of the way full for whatever reason. (It's not like a bag of potato chips, people... you do not need that much air to package protein powder).

So I took a gamble and bought some "British Nutritions Whey Platinum Standard."

Unfortunately, I've been told by a local trainer and several other people here that British Nutritions is - of course- actually an Indian brand and that protein powder produced in India is unregulated and therefore fake. Completely useless. I don't know how true that is, but hearing it multiple times certainly casts enough doubt on protein powder purchased in here... enough for me to not do it again.

I did have to break down though and try these bad boys. WORK-OUT BARS! I found them at Qmart.

It claims to be a high source of protein, but upon further inspection, it's only 10 grams of protein for a 200-calorie bar. I don't know if I would consider that a high source of protein. I'd rather eat a couple of eggs.

So I searched extensively for what most people agree is the best source of isolated whey protein- Optimum Nutrition. The cost: 3000 Rs for 1 bottle ($65 for 2 lbs).

NO THANK YOU.

So I broke down and bought some on Amazon for less than half the price. And it arrived and I'm so happy.

But as much as I do love protein powder as a great supplement on days I fall short on protein intake, nothing, nothing, nothing beats whole, natural protein sources. It's extraordinarily easy to get lots of protein if you're non-veg in India. It's doable if you're veg, you just have to be a bit more conscientious!

One of my favorite favorite foods: EGGS! Quiche, scrambled, over easy, you name it. I love frying them sunny side up over easy and putting them on top of a cabbage salad so the yolk makes a dressing of sorts. Delicious. They are !ncredible, edible eggs.

Whole grains and alternative flours can be a GREAT source of protein, and I've been totally surprised at the variety available in India!

Some of the most interesting are:

Jawari (Eng: Sorghum)

Bajra (Eng: Pearl Millet)

Besam flour (Eng: Soybean flour)

Rawa (Eng: Semolina)

I still have TONS of more grains and non-wheat flours to explore. One of my favorite places is the grains room in Balaji Grand Bazaar on Rd 1. They have rows and rows of dried goods, from nuts to grains to nut flours to rice varieties and more. It's incredible.

Sometimes I just pick up a bag of something whose name I don't recognize and bring it home to google. Then I have to figure out what to do with it before the pantry moths break into the bag and get to it. Makes for some nice challenges.

And the BEST and CHEAPEST source of protein for vegetarians......

LENTILS ANS BEANS. Chole, dal makhani, urad dal, red rajma... I never thought I could love lentils and beans like I do now. If you think beans are boring or don't think you like them, try them Indian-style. Indians know how to make darn good dishes with these guys.

Weekend Roundup: corn, pie crust, and more pie crust

I had a crazy hankering for CORN this weekend. Corn in India (well, in Hyderabad) is often more chewy and less sweet than corn in the US. When we first arrived here last year we were told repeatedly "It's impossible to get sweet corn here, you might as well not try!"

WRONG! Once again, India has delivered, and proven that if you know where to look you can get almost anything.

Sweet corn (sometimes called American corn) is often easily found. In the malls here, there are kiosks that sell "American Corn" as a snack. At first I thought it was weird, but then I realized it's an awesome idea. Little cups of corn with masala, pepper, or sugar flavoring.... delicious. And much more healthy for you than the Auntie Ann's 800-calorie pretzel bites dipped in garlic butter you can buy in American malls in the States. (mmmm now I want Auntie Ann's..... nom nom).

(SIDENOTE: The best thing ever about the kiosks though is that we once saw one in Inorbit Mall in Hi-Tech city with a picture of a guy in a University of Iowa swetshirt on the side of the corn kiosk. It looked like it had been randomly downloaded off of someone's Facebook pictures. Awesome.)

Anyway, back to corn. You can sometimes find it easily at your local store. Friday I had no such luck and went instead to Takari, the vegetable shop on Road 1 I always rave about.

Friday night we had a friend over so I bought a bunch of corn to make corn salad (or did we invite him over so that I could by corn and make corn salad?? hmmmmm....).

It was an absurdly easy salad- my favorite kinds. I put the "recipe" (aka "the list of ingredients I felt like putting into the salad) below.

And, a staple in our house, eggplant marinara with fresh tomato sauce.

... and apple pie for dessert. Probably the easiest pie to make in India, since apples are available all year round. I love this crust recipe- if you take the time to ensure the butter is really cold when you cut it into the flour, and rechill it again after you've put it into the pie pan and before you put it into the oven, it comes out deliciously flaky every time.

This is all that was left after I finally remembered to take a photo of it.

Saturday we had about a cob of leftover corn and made simple tacos for dinner (with atta chapatis)

With fresh papaya and guava... YUMMMMMMMMMM.

The next day I almost started cooking a plain old omelet when I remembered...

....SOME LEFTOVER CRUST DOUGH IN THE FREEZER!!! Mini quiches!!!!

I have been known to throw out the last bit of pie crust, but I will NEVER do such a sinful thing again. Ever. Why throw out leftover dough? Quiches, mini-pies... the list of uses is endless.

So, I'm sorry dough, that I've done that to your kind before. Never again.

Mini-quiches were a good chance to use up the little bit of cheese, peppers (Hindi: mirchi) and tomato that were still hanging out in our fridge after the corn salad.

Chop chop chop.

Pressed the dough into little muffin cups.

Filled with quiche materials.

Twenty-five minutes later.... done.

Hello mini quiches! Hello breakfast!

Corn Salad

Fresh corn kernels, cut off the cob

Tomatoes, diced

Bell Pepper/capsicum, diced

Red onion, diced

Cilantro

Freshly ground black pepper

Salt

Tiny bit of olive oil

Pie Crust (makes enough for two "layers"- two pie crusts or top and bottom of one pie)

1 cup unsalted butter, chilled

3 cups all-purpose flour

3 tbs of white sugar (omit if you are using this for a savory crust)

1/3 c of ice water

Combine flour and sugar. Cut in butter with a pastry blender or food processor until crumbly. Add ice water slowly, mixing with hand or blender until it starts to clump. Lightly knead into a ball, but don't overwork dough. Divide dough into two parts, wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 30 minutes before using. Can be frozen for up to a week or two.

When ready to use, roll out and arrange in pie pan. Refrigerate again for 10 minutes before baking.

Recovery!

It's been 3 days since the Great Stomach Bug of 2011 and we are recovering well.

I had to cancel my appointment- which was originally scheduled a few hours into the Great Stomach Bug of 2011- for my left foot pain. I rescheduled for Wednesday and left the appointment with a 150 Rs ($3) ankle strap and some "Chymoral Forte."

I had to look this stuff up. Apparently it's an enzyme tablet that helps promote protein growth, or something to that effect. There's very little information available online because taking enzymes to treat soft tissue injuries (or any illness/injury) is rarely practiced outside of India.

But for the sake of adventure, I'm trying it out. So far no improvement... will report back in a few days.

I haven't really been up for cooking lately due to obvious reasons. But yesterday we both had appetites for one of my favorite favorite favorite Indian dishes.

What could this rolled up newspaper have inside??

Fresh hot atta chapatis!!!

... which accompanies rice....

.... which accompanies dal!!!!

Oh man, I love dal. So much. For the uninitiated, it's lentils with Indian spices and it's amazing. If you tone down the spice and the oil it's a really great comfort food. With white rice and plain chapatis it was just what the doctor ordered.

But the most sure sign that the appetites are back and all is almost returned to normal is....

... an empty container of ice cream.

Delhi Belly: Not just an Aamir Khan flick

A couple weeks ago I posted on my Gchat status "enjoying Delhi Belly: The movie, not the sickness!" as I had gone out with a few friends to see the new movie whose title referenced the fact that food poisoning/stomach bugs are so prevalent in India that it had its own name.

Well, yesterday it was Delhi Belly: the sickness, not the movie. Yes. We got hit. Hard.

In the year we have been in Hyderabad, neither of have gotten sick. And we (were) both a little smug about that fact. I -ironically- got really sick the day after I arrived back in the US for a quick visit in May, but that's it.

That all changed Tuesday night. Now that it's over, I can kind of laugh about the whole thing. It was a pretty absurd experience.

4:45 AM: Benny succumbs to The Belly. And our water is shut off. And it's storming outside. (Water water everywhere, not a drop to spare..?)

6:45 AM: I follow suite.

We were lucky. The worst of the illness was over in 6 hours. It wrecked havoc on both of us though for a full 24 hours. Neither of us could move much, which led to a day lying motionless on the couch, falling in and out of sleep in front of the tv.

This is what we watched:

30 Rock: Somewhere between 3-4 episodes (it's a bit of a blur)

Top Chef: (Only 8 minutes before watching people prepare food suddenly became a terrible idea)

I Am Legend: (I was asleep for most of it)

Lonely Planet's Road Less Traveled: China

Friends: 1/2 episode

Fatal Attraction

The rest of Top Chef (when we were feeling better)

We also spent the parts of the day when we felt well enough to talk discussing who the likely culprit of our illness was. I am pretty skeptical most of the time that it's possible to trace exactly what it was that makes someone sick, but I think when two people who just ate dinner together both fall ill within 2 hours of each other later that night, it's pretty obvious.

So here are the possible suspects, in ascending order of likeliness of guilt.

#4: Chicken Korma. Admittedly, the sauce of this korma is left over from a dish consumed earlier this week. I hated to see it go to waste, so I bought some chicken and cooked it in the leftover sauce. It seems kind of sketchy admitting to this now. However, it was unlikely the culprit, as I did not eat any of it last night.

#3 Leek-Potato soup. It would be a shame if this was the cause of our illness, because it was so darn good. And likely it isn't: it was stewing for 45 minutes before we ate it.

#2 Garlic fish. I bought this fish fresh a few hours earlier. Though I pan-seared it, it's definitely a possibility.

But the number one suspect (I think) who brought us 24 hours of complete misery is......

#1 This beautiful, fresh spinach-almond-pear salad. :(

We eat fresh, raw vegetables all the time and we've never had a problem. But I know it's a HUGE source of illness in India and that we take a risk every time we eat them. Spinach, lettuce, and cabbage all grow on the ground and there are often major sources of waste nearby fields growing them. And of course, trucks which transport raw vegetables are major breeding grounds for all sorts of bugs and bacteria, and there exist few regulations for workers to wash their hands when handling food. (Soap is also rarely found in many restrooms)

But that said, I'd be remiss if I had all but forgotten about the recent e-coli breakout in Europe, or multiple salmonella infections in the US in the past few years. Food poisoning, Delhi Belly, whatever you want to call it... it can happen anywhere.

So anyway.... such is life. We won't stop eating fresh greens (though we definitely won't be having them anytime soon), and who knows if that's what caused our Delhi Belly anyway? We'll be here another year and there's no use in missing out on India's AWESOME food just because there is that -slight slight- chance we could get sick one or two more times (fingers crossed that's all it would be) while we're here.

Oh yeah, and all the ingredients yesterday were purchased at a major, upscale grocery store, which just goes to show that no matter how "careful" one may be about avoiding dives, hole-in-the-wall restaurants, or local vegetable-wallahs, Delhi Belly still happens.

And that's my excuse for continuing to patronize those type of places!

Running around Hussain Sagar

Saturday, after the Watermelon Party, we woke up late. We didn't really have anything planed so I took advantage of the time by making one of the recipes I've been meaning to try out from the blog Mind Your Bees and Trees: Kaiserchmaarn, or giant Austrian pancakes. Benny loves pancakes, and these looked like a fun twist on the traditional ones we make.

The recipe can be found HERE. I followed it closely, though I used whole-wheat instead of all-purpose or a blend, and we didn't have raisins.

Our honey was a jar of Kashmiri saffron honey we bought a few months ago at the All-India Crafts Mela at Shiparamam.

Making the giant pancake was fun.

And it flipped well!

Shredded. We put cinnamon and powdered sugar over it.

Verdict: GOOD! Benny liked them and said they tasted healthy, haha. They were- the ingredients are mostly eggs and whole-wheat flour. Quite a simple recipe, too. We will definitely make again. Thanks Amanda and Kristen!!

Later that day we went for a run around Hussain Sagar, the large lake in the middle of Hyderabad. We've been there before for various events and outings, but I have been wanting to try the course around it for a while.

This is the route we took:

We started at Eat Street, where the green mark on the left is. Eat Street is a collection of small restaurant stalls and kiosks overlooking the lake. It's a nice setting actually, though quite crowded in the late evenings. We went around the lake clockwise, until Lumpini Park where the blue route-marker ends.

My skin-colored knee brace, which has been AMAZING at keeping my right knee pain at bay. I never run without it now.

A train!

Happening upon some statues. We actually didn't stop running to take this pic- both of us were kind of hopping in place.

Keep on truckin'.

Really beautiful tomb.

One of the parts where the path pulls away from the river and you end up on a road. This area isn't so busy or dangerous.

Finished! enjoying the view.

The run around Hussain Sagar is so-so. Here are the pros and cons:

PROS

- It's pretty much exactly 10K- just a hair under at 5.8 miles.

- Some sections are really enjoyable- nice brick paths, shaded, next to the lake.

- FREE!!

CONS

- The path surrounding the lake is not exactly continuous. Some parts spit you out onto incredibly busy roads with no sidewalk. You HAVE to walk these parts, as you're so close to the oncoming traffic that you can reach out and touch motos and buses passing you by.

- Some parts are not scenic at all. The road pulls away from the lake at times and you end up in long stretches of graveled roads with rundown shops around you. Not the worst thing in the world, but not necessarily the most lovely run you'll ever do.

MY RECOMMENDATION:

Start at Eat Street and run counter-clockwise. You can get in a good 5K/3 miles before the nice shaded pedestrian path next to the lake turns into a harrowing highway where you're walking sideways just to avoid getting hit. Then you can turn back and end up back at Eat Street for a full 10K jog.

After we got home, someone needed a little R&R

I also noticed I was sunburned only on the top of my wrists, around where my watch is. Patch of about 2 inches x 2 inches. It's very attractive.

The unfortunate news after this run is that even though my knee held up beautifully, my left foot, which started hurting after a run last week, is in a lot of pain. It was a dull pain during the run and has only intensified to the point where I now walk with an absurd limp every where I go.

I think it's some sort of tendonitis in my foot. Will be heading to a doctor or PT soon. In the meantime, absolutely NO running at all.

AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!